Parenting Tool: Coaching
Hey there, Momma!
It sounds like COACHING might be the best heart-based parenting tool to use with your son right now.
You want to connect with your son’s heart, but you’re not sure how. Coaching creates a partnership with your son.
Below you will find some practical tips on how to use coaching to connect with your son’s heart.
This is just one of the 7 heart-based parenting tools. Check your inbox over the next few days and weeks for more practical tools you can use to connect with your son’s heart.
Your first email should be in your inbox now! (Be sure to check your updates folder). This email will explain what it means to parent from a heart-based approach.
Heart-Based Parenting Tool: Coaching
Coaching creates a partnership for change. There are two aspects of coaching: partnership and practice.
PARTNERSHIP
Partnership lets your son know that you are on his side. You are your son’s best coach or counselor! Let your son know you’re on the same team, and that you’re working together towards the goal of heart change.
Practical Tips on How to Partner With Your Son:
- Affirm what he is doing right.
- Focus on the goal of where your son is going, rather than only focusing on the problem.
- Expect improvement. Hold your son accountable for change.
- Be practical and specific. Tell your son what you want him to do differently next time.
- Affirm approximate right behavior. Don’t wait for perfection before affirming him. Instead, encourage small steps in the right direction. Allowing your son to see his success gives him hope that he can change.
- Connection is key to an effective coaching relationship. Kids can only take as much pressure as the relationship allows.
PRACTICE
Practice is a significant part of coaching. Your son needs to practice doing the right thing in order to break out of negative behavior patterns. Kids must face the same challenge over and over in order to develop new ways of thinking and acting.
Practice is part of correction. Don’t just give your son a consequence for wrong behavior. Go back and practice doing things the right way.
Practical Tips for Practicing
- Don’t try to avoid conflict! It’s okay to gently push your son into areas of discomfort in order to give him opportunities to practice doing the right thing. Pressure helps to develop internal character.
- Use the phrase: “This is an opportunity for you to practice doing the right thing. You need to go back and try again.”
- Practice is part of repentance. You don’t want your son to merely stop doing the wrong thing. You want him to practice doing the right thing.
- Correction only focuses on what a child has done wrong; practice focuses on what the child needs to do differently next time.
- Practice sessions help to retrain our kids’ brains and develop new grooves in their mind by developing new patterns of thinking and acting in response to a challenge.
Go check your inbox right now for your first email from me. Be sure to check your “updates” folder. Then, right-click on the email from Laurie Christine, select “Move to Inbox,” then select “Do this for future emails from this sender.” That way you won’t miss out on any of the parenting tools I’ll be sending your way!
Laurie Christine is a Certified Biblical Parenting Coach, trained by the National Center for Biblical Parenting (NCBP). All information covered in this series of emails is courtesy of the NCBP. For more information, check out the resources on their website, www.biblicalparenting.org
MEET LAURIE CHRISTINE
Laurie Christine is a certified Biblical Parenting Coach, author, podcast host, wife, and mom of four wild, loud, adventurous boys.
Her podcast, Redeeming the Chaos, invites moms of boys to join her in the wild, wonderful adventure of raising courageous boys and connecting them with Christ.
In addition to hosting a podcast, Laurie writes devotional Bible stories for families. As a mom of four young boys, she understands how important it is for parents to connect with their children, while communicating the truth of God’s Word to them in a way they can understand.
MORE RESOURCES
Check out these resources from the National Center for Biblical Parenting
Parenting is Heart Work
(Affiliate Link)
In this book you will learn:
* How to connect to your child’s heart to bring about change.
* Ways to correct that are more powerful and last longer.
* To help your child reign in emotions.
* How to use common, everyday activity to build life-skills.
* Biblical, practical tools that work.
PHW Training Manual
(Affiliate Link)
In this book, you will learn:
* How to develop strategic, biblical, practical routines of family life.
* How to give day-to-day instructions in a way that builds cooperation and responsibility.
* Practical ideas for connecting with your kids emotionally so that their hearts will be soft and teachable.
* How to integrate key success principles into your family.
Motivate Your Child
(Affiliate Link)
In this book you will learn:
* How to parent in ways that build internal motivation so that kids don’t have to rely on you to get things done.
* The four promptings of the conscience and how to coordinate your parenting to takeadvantage of them.
* Ways to energize your spiritual training with fun and creativity.
* How to help children respond to mistakes instead of blaming, defending, or justifying.
MYC Action Plan
(Affliate Link)
In this book, you will learn:
* A step-by-step guide to identify a specific problem and then define a character-based solution.
* How to craft a parenting plan tailored to your child’s unique gifts and needs.
When parents have defined plans, they move forward with more confidence, see changes more quickly, and experience hope as they grow in their relationship with their child.
COACHING
Are you interested in working with Laurie Christine in our eight week, one-on-one parent coaching program?